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Topic: Age appropriate impressions ? (Read 3986 times)

Hi guys! Just kind of wondering what your "take" might be, on age appropriate impressions/personas. For example, I'd been thinking of taking on an Imperial German,or maybe a WWII Wehrmacht impression. I know that most outfits are pretty relaxed about taking on new members, and that's OK. For me, I try really hard to present a believable impression in my 18th c. and 1812 impressions and I do factor in my age/appearance into the persona. I'm 51, and obviously not an "iron youth". Do any of you have any thoughts on age appropriate role assignment?

There's plenty of places to do an older impression for both WWI and WWII German. For each impression, I worked out a plausible timeline (old timer recalled to active service) and have solbuchs to reflect this. Naturally, impressions such as stosstruppen or falschirmjager are out but there's still plenty of room. Landwher for WWI is a natural.

For WWI, I do an impression of an older person in their 40s (I'm 46) that was recalled to active service in 1915. My unit is a Bavarian cavalry unit (2nd Chevauleger) and while we did rotate into the front line on a regular basis, we also performed rear area duties such as POW guarding and provost marshall duties. It's a perfect fit for me.

Thanks! I appreciate the input. The recall scenario sounds like a really good fit. I wasn't sure how it would be, to be the likely "old guy" in the unit. Now it doesn't necessarily seem to be too bad of a role to take on. This could be fun!......

I live in the NW corner of Ohio, ( Fair to say a good length's drive to any cool historical event...) I've checked out the IR 23 site that you posted. ---Pretty cool! It's definitely given me food for thought. If I weren't engaged with 18th c. & 1812 , I could get into this kind of thing real easily. Do you do early or late war impression?

North-West Ohio... Isn't that close to Fort Meigs? I've heard that "Muster on the Maumee" (sp?) is one of the better timeline events out there (it's in June I think), and does not Fort Meigs also do a good amount of other colonial events throughout the year?

Spot on, sir! I'm about 45 min. from Ft. Meigs. Muster is a good place to see some quality impressions, and just about any time frame that you might want to see. Roman army to Gulf War. Father's Day weekend is when that event happens. --It's been usually the first hot event of the season. I don't have their itinerary, but I know that they have a pretty decent F&I event there, as well as Rev War, and of course, 1812 events. Really a nice site! I'm told it is the biggest period fort in North America. It was at Muster about two years ago, that kind of prompted this topic thread of age appropriate impressions. I was chatting it up with some Wehrmacht guys, and was flattered by an invitation to join up with them. That's basicly what got me thinking about being an older guy joining up with a unit, and what would be a believable persona for anyone in that particular situation.

Sorry to come so late to this thread. If you're keen on WW2, one interesting fact that I've found from German records: at the time of the German invasion of France in 1940, 45% of the armed forces was over the age of 40. Many of these guys were the seasoned vets of WW1, and their combat experience was extremely useful in making such short work of the French. There aren't many events yet, but 1939-40 reenacting is extremely interesting to me. Feel free to PM me if you have any questions.